His fame had already faded, it was a tour for his second album, and he could not sell tickets.

The venue, "The Muny" (outdoor ampitheater in St. Louis) had him as part of the summer concert series, and to help boost sales, were giving free tix to anyone who bought tix to any other concert in the series. (I got my free tix when I bought tix to Neil Young a week before.)

Despite the large amount of free tix given out, and the fact that the last five rows of the venue were "free seats" (City Park policy, fenced off seats that were for free for all venues.) Despite all attempts to fill the seats, only 50 people came to it. Scattered through five or six rows.

But bless his heart, Julian ran out on stage and performed like it was a packed house. Held nothing back. You would think he was in front of a sold-out football stadium.

As soon as the show ended, he stepped off stage, and personally walked up to each person at the show and thanked them for coming out. Very kind...very cordial. While 45 of us were simply happy he did this, 5 true fans of his went haywire that he shook their hands and talked to them. He even took pictures with fans and signed autographs, the whole biatche signed my ticket stub.)

Funny thing was, his show was really good. And it really made me want to like his stuff. He really had heart and did not come off as spoiled rock star kid, even being the son of a beatle. But sadly, in the shadow of dad John, he will never get a fair chance at impressing people with his music. (He realeased a really good album a few years back that the critics loved.)

It is sad to see this happen to rock stars who are in the decline of their career. They are being humbled at every turn. You learn quickly who is a nice guy and who is a real dick. In the case of Geldof, I would say he is probably one of the nice ones. A dick would not have done all he had for the third world while killing his own career in the process.

But rock and roll is a moody b*tch. we are not looking for the nice one to take home to mom, we are looking for the psychopath that will kill our pets and f*ck us like a banshee.

ChickenGeorgeVII:Reminds me of a Julian Lennon concert I went to in 1988.

Cool story. I was wondering why Bobby didn't do the same thing for the first gig. The article says "fewer than 50 people turned up" which i guess means his equipment would have been set up and his band ready to go. Canceling a show after people arrive sucks.

There's no way Geldof gets booked to play a 12,000 seat arena, solo. That was out of the Rats' league at the height of their fame. He might have been booked to play one of its smaller rooms, but there's no way he's booked to play the main auditorium.

This page says that he had flown in from South Africa for the gig, but Geldof's own webpage (which reports the cancellation of the Rome gig) shows he's been gigging in Europe all month.

Sounds like you would know, but I really woudn't have thought so. The rats weren't even succesful enough to qualify as novelty 1 hit wonders, he couldn't have made 10s of millions from his music career. Perhaps he had money to start with or was smart with what he did make as a musician, but I seriously doubt he's a "rich rock star".

In 1992, Geldof co-founded Planet 24, a television production company that has made such programmes as The Big Breakfast, The Word and Survivor. In 1994, the company was sold to Carlton Television for an estimated $7 million, while the rights to Survivor were retained. He then launched an online travel business, which sold in 2001 for an estimated $17 million. His company Ten Alps Communications is a media, entertainment and marketing venture in which he retains 8%.[6] A subsidiary of Ten Alps creates 'branded environments' and has worked for BP, JP Morgan, EMI, Disney, FHM, L'oreal, UK Ministry of Defence, Glaxo Smithkline, Microsoft and the British Foreign Office.

Wealth

Ten Alps - a PR, broadcast and television company, whose current client list includes BP, JP Morgan, Ford, the UK Foreign Office and Ministry of Defence, EMI, Disney and many more - was founded by Alex Connock, Bob Geldof and Des Shaw. Connock bought Planet 24 Radio for £1, on the day that Carlton Television acquired Geldof's previous company Planet 24 for a reported £15 million. Ten Alps posted profits of £600,000 in 2005, on a turnover of £37,000,000.Geldof's wealth was estimated by Broadcast magazine, in 2001, to be £30 million [7], a position of 18th in a list of UK broadcasters.He is currently embroiled in a legal wrangle with his former bandmates in the Boomtown Rats, who accuse him of withholding substantial profits from the band's recordings from them.

So, he not a rich rockstar, he's a rich capitalist corporate shill greedhead.

Sounds a eensy bit hypocritical, asking people to forgive trillions of dollars in debt while ripping off his old band for what he owes them, doesn't it?